Staffing shortages are causing significant delays to Richmond upon Thames Council's internal audit work, with a considerable portion of the planned reviews either incomplete or yet to begin. The council faces recruitment challenges for experienced internal auditors, a situation described as common across London councils.
The Audit, Standards and Statutory Accounts Committee heard on Tuesday 20 October 2026 that only 51% of the planned internal audits for the 2026/27 financial year were completed or in progress by the end of September. This falls behind the council's target for the first six months of the year. In total, 55 audits were planned for the year, with 18 not yet started as of 30 September 2026. In previous years, the council has typically completed more than 90% of its audit plan, a target it aims to meet again this financial year.
Andrew Hamilton, Assistant Director of the South West London Audit Partnership (SWLAP), attributed the delays primarily to staffing vacancies within the internal audit team. Recruitment for a Principal Auditor and a Trainee Auditor is ongoing, with interviews for the principal role taking place this week. Applications for the trainee role will be progressed if a Principal Auditor is appointed, with the onboarding of these new roles expected to boost capacity
and accelerate completion of the remaining reviews.
To address the capacity issues and mitigate the risks associated with delayed audits, an additional part-time contractor has been engaged through an agency and will become full-time from November until the end of the financial year. The council also continues to utilise specialist resources from Forvis Mazars and KPMG to supplement their work and complete more straightforward audits.
Despite the current shortfall, Hamilton expressed confidence that the team would meet its target of completing 90% of the audit plan by the end of the financial year. He noted that some audits were intentionally scheduled for the third and fourth quarters due to the operational requirements of the audited departments.
However, the delays have raised concerns about the council's ability to maintain robust oversight. Councillor Anton McNulty-Howard questioned whether the council was doing enough to ensure a greater rate of completion, suggesting that the current situation indicated a lack of robust action. Hamilton acknowledged that the resource issue affects audits at all stages, leading to more 'not started' and 'in progress' audits than desired.
He assured the committee that if the full plan cannot be completed, lower-risk audits would be dropped first. The decision on which audits to drop would be based on the risk profile assigned to each audit in the plan, with the Assistant Director of SWLAP making the final determination.
The report notes that we are behind the curve slightly but we think that realistically we think we will be at the right place by the end of the year certainly would have met our 90% target of achieving the audit plan.
More information on the committee's discussions can be found in the Public reports pack for the meeting on Tuesday 20 October 2026: Public reports pack Tuesday 20-Oct-2026 19.00 Audit Standards and Statutory Accounts Committee.pdf